Excel behaving as if it were two tables

Copper Contributor

I have created an Excel document from two other Excel documents, but they will not sort across the 'invisible boundary.' They are the same width, and have the same fields but they sort in two groups. Any ideas?

4 Replies

@geoteach337 

 

Not seeing the actual spreadsheet, relying solely on your description, one can only hypothesize. You'd have to do the testing of any hypothesis.

 

So one hypothesis is that you copied and pasted the one table adjacent to the other (perhaps even removing column headings from the second), but left them as Table1 and Table2 (or whatever names had been assigned, if any)......so although the look to the human eye as a single table, Excel doesn't "see" them that way.

IF that fits, then you need to somehow help Excel "see" differently. 

 

When I try (just now) to replicate what you've described--creating two small tables, identical rows and columns, and then copying and pasting together--they are treated as a single table and sorted. It's only if I leave a blank row between them that they're not.

 

So I have to ask if it's possible for you to post the spreadsheet if it persists in not sorting as one.

I did an aggressive component copy and paste into a new document and it seemed to have cleared any kind of weird, bogus Microsoft code that had infected this file. I wish it was properly coded.

@geoteach337 wrote: I did an aggressive component copy and paste into a new document and it seemed to have cleared any kind of weird, bogus Microsoft code that had infected this file. I wish it was properly coded.

 

I'm not even sure what you mean by some of what you've written. What, for example, I "an aggressive component copy and paste"? 

 

Anyway, it's also not clear if you're still seeking help. If so, can you post a copy of the material in question?

Hi. A copy and paste of the whole file into another Excel file did not correct the error, so I broke it up into parts, the header, some sectionalised into columns, and some sectionalised into rows, to get the errant code to reset, and it seems now to behave in a compliant way. That's what aggressive cutting and pasting means! Thanks for your help. Problem, for now, solved. Best, Andrew

@mathetes